World Series Numbers

The only numbers that really matters are 2 and 0, as in the Giants 2-0 lead over the Rangers, but that isn’t going to stop me from relaying a whole host of numbers that have come to light in the 2010 World Series.

* There have been 106 World Series match-ups, and this is the 52nd time that a team has taken a 2-0 Series lead. Of the 51 previous times it occurred, the team with the 2-0 lead has won 40 times – a winning percentage of 78.4 percent. The last seven teams to go ahead 2-0 have won the Series, and 13 of the last 14 (Atlanta came back in 1996). This is the fourth time that the Giants have led a Series 2-0, and they won each of the previous three times (1922, 1933 and 1954).

* Matt Cain is a star (note to East Coasters, he has been for a while now, he didn’t just all of a sudden get good). Cain is one of only four pitchers in history to post 20 or more scoreless innings in a single postseason. Here are the others: Christy Mathewson (27 IP), Waite Hoyt (27 IP), Kenny Rogers (23 IP) and Carl Hubbell (20.0). Some more Cain knowledge. Cain is the 8th starting pitcher in postseason history who has not allowed an earned run in 3-straight starts. Cain is the fourth pitcher out of that group to do so in his first three postseason starts. Only one pitcher has ever gone 4-straight – Whitey Ford in 1960-61.

* Elvis Andrus and Nelson Cruz both lost their playoff hitting streaks in Game 2 at 12 games. They had become the 4th and 5th players to compile a 12-game hitting streak to open up their playoff careers. The record is 15-straight by Marquis Grissom in 1995-96.

* The Giants, going all the way back to the New York vintage, have won 47 World Series games. The only two teams with more victories are the Yankees (134) and the Cardinals (52).

* FOUR: The number of starters the Giants have used through the playoffs, and each one of them is homegrown – Tim Lincecum, Matt Cain, Jonathan Sanchez and Madison Bumgarner, That makes the Giants the first team since the 1986 Red Sox to have a 4-man World Series rotation of entirely homegrown hurlers (Roger Clemens, Bruce Hurst, Oil Can Boyd and Al Nipper).

* The Giants don’t score seven runs very often, they were held to six or fewer runs in 141 of their previous 172 games before Game 2, but when they do score seven runs they hardly ever lose (they are 29-4). Speaking of scoring runs, here are some other amazingly relevant facts.

The Giants went 4-for-9 with runners in scoring position in Game 2 and are now 13-for-26 in the Series.

Each of the Giants runs, all 20 of them, have come with two outs.

The Giants have scored more runs in their last 12 innings (19) than they did in winning the NLCS (17).

The Giants have scored nine runs in back-to-back World Series games, only the ninth time a team has done that in Series history.

* The heart of the Rangers lineup has been held in check. Michael Young (1-for-8), Josh Hamilton (1-for-8) and Nelson Cruz (1-for-9) are hitting a combined .120 through two games.

* Edgar Renteria, who is playing with a torn left biceps, has played 63 games at shortstop in the playoffs, second in baseball history to the 147 games of Derek Jeter. Oh, and after producing three RBI in Game 2 Renteria now has one 3-RBI game this season.

* Cliff Lee had never allowed more than three extra base hits in any playoff game. In Game 1 he allowed three doubles to Freddy Sanchez.

* TWO: The number of catchers in World Series history who have hit third in the lineup. Yogi Berra did it for the Yankees in 1947, and Buster Posey is currently doing it for the Giants.

By Ray Flowers

World Series: Giants vs. Rangers

With the 2010 World Series set to start today I will go through the lineups of the San Francisco Giants and the Texas Rangers to see which club has the advantage.

Oh, and if you are in search of that link for the NL Rookie of the Year, well, there you go.

By Ray Flowers

Around the Horn: NLCS Preview

Ray Flowers breaks down the National League Championship Series with a position by position breakdown of the Phillies and the Giants. Here is a link to the ALCS Preview in case you missed it.

By Ray Flowers

Around the Horn: August 30, 2010

(1) Aroldis Chapman to be called up on Tuesday.

(2) Manny Ramirez officially a White Sox player.

(3) Colby Rasmus (calf) back in the lineup.

(4) Nelson Cruz (hamstring) back from DL.

(5) Freddy Sanchez super hot at dish.

(6) Jose Tabata impressing with Pirates.

(7) Carlos Lee finally hitting his stride.

(8) Daniel Hudson a star for D’backs.

By Ray Flowers

Around the Horn: August 11, 2010

(1) Giants trade for Mike Fontenot.

(2) Curtis Granderson to revamp swing.

(3) Ryan Braun (wrist) takes swings in the cage.

(4) Gordon Beckham (groin) back in lineup.

(5) Placido Polanco will try to play through elbow injury.

(6) Astros have trouble in the 9th inning.

(7) Matt Kemp out of the Lineup Again. Should you be concerned?

By Ray Flowers

Wacky Wednesday

Wednesday is a weird day. It’s the middle of the five day work week for most, but for me its just another day (I can’t remember the last time I actually worked only five days in a week). In fact, I can’t remember the last time that I took a real vacation – it’s been years. That signals a couple of things. (1) I’m the best employee of all-time. (2) I need to get a life. (3) I really need to get a girlfriend so I have a reason to take some time off. With that off my chest – I wonder if that was some Freudian comment related to #3? – let me get to some comments about what is going on across the field of baseball on this day.

* Milton Bradley ahs been activated from the restricted list and is back in the lineup on Wednesday for the Mariners. Hopefully he won’t fall asleep in the dugout between innings with Ken Griffey Jr. I put the over/under at a Bradley outburst or injury at nine days.

* Ike Davis will be the Mets’ cleanup hitter for the foreseeable future according to Adam Rubin of ESPN. Makes total sense doesn’t it? I mean Davis is hitting .241 over his last 16 games, has one homer in his last 11 games and has 17 Ks in his last 54 at-bats. Do the Mets ever do anything that makes sense?

* Am I the only person in America who thinks that Chris Berman of ESPN has an expiration date that we are about eight years past?

* Trevor Hoffman will spend the next few days working on his mechanics to see if he can fix whatever in the hell is causing him to look like the best batting practice pitcher in baseball. Quickly, here is what I see. He has allowed 69 percent of batted balls to go in the air, 20 percent above his career rate. Combine that fact with a 20.0 percent HR/F mark, almost triple his career rate (6.7 percent), and it’s easy to see why he has struggled, that and the fact that he has almost doubled his walk rate. He’s actually throwing his fastball at 85.4 mph, a mere tenth of a mile below his career 85.5 percent mark. While people continue to deride the location of his pitches, it is odd to see that the percentage of pitches he has thrown outside the strike zone that have been hit is 66.7 percent, a massive increase over his career rate of 51.6 percent. You could probably get him for nothing at this point, and that’s something I would do since I don’t think he is done being an effective big league hurler. It wouldn’t hurt to pick up Carlos Villanueva though since he should at least get a shot a few saves in the short-term thanks to his 11.76 K/9 rate and 1.06 WHIP over 19 appearances this season.

* What the hell are the Rockies doing with Chris Iannetta? The Rockies claim they have a plan to get the young bopper back in action with the big club, but at this point I’m wondering if that outfit is being led by Elmer Fudd. I mean really. Iannetta is hitting .375 with five homers, 21 RBI and a 1.205 OPS in 14 games in Triple-A. You think he should be in the majors given those numbers? Morons (and yes I’m upset because I have Iannetta wasting away on one of my rosters).

* Freddy Sanchez has been activated from the DL for the Giants. He’ll likely end up being eased back into action. There is no truth to the rumor that the average age of the Giants’ infield will be high enough to get them a senior citizen discount on the Grand Slam breakfast at Denny’s.

By Ray Flowers

Around the Horn: May6, 2010

(1) The Reds will not demote Drew Stubbs. You can also read My Tooth Hurts.

(2) Who is gonna lead off for the Marlins – Cameron Maybin, Chris Coghlan or Emilio Bonifacio?

(3) Jair Jurrjens to DL – replaced by Kris Medlen.

(4) Juan Uribe or Freddy Sanchez for Giants?

(5) Is Matt Garza a top-10 SP? You can also read Impact Report – Matt Garza.

(6) Lance Berkman will waive no-trade clause.

(7) Carlos Lee finally goes deep.

(8) What are the Orioles going to do in the 9th inning?

By Ray Flowers

Winter Meetings Update

I love the Winter Meetings. In fact, I’ve combined the event with Twitter to form a duo kind of like peanut butter and jelly. I admit it. I’m addicted now. I wake up in the middle of the night thinking ‘I’m sure the readers would love to hear that thought.’ Don’t worry, I keep a pad by my bed to write down the thoughts that hit me when most of the U.S. is counting candy canes in their sleep.

* Still reeling over the Three-team Blockbuster Deal between the Tigers, Yankees and D’backs? You can read my breakdown of the deal by clicking on the link, but there is still something I don’t get – why did the D’backs enter this deal as the third team? I think they will rue the day that they let Max Scherzer go for Edwin Jackson. Maybe I’m wrong here, but honestly, I have a hard time believing that. Whether Scherzer is a top of the rotation arm, or a closer (a potential given his somewhat violent delivery), as long as his arm doesn’t fly off I see this kid being something special.

* John Lackey is regarded by all as the top free agent hurler on the market. However, it doesn’t seem likely that anyone is going to fall all over themselves to throw $100 million his way. In fact, he might have to wait a bit and hope someone gets a bit desperate to hit that figure.

* I wrote yesterday how I thought it was a ruse that Rafael Soriano would accept the Braves arbitration offer in What a Great Monday. Turns out I’ve got that proverbial egg on my face as he did just that. As a result, the Braves are facing the prospect of having to trade Soriano or spend roughly a fifth of their entire payroll on Soriano, Billy Wagner and Takashi Saito. Soriano has already submitted a group of teams he would like to join with one possible destination being the Orioles who have already mentioned their intention to acquire a closer.

Have heard barely a peep dealing with Matt Holliday. The other big bopper, Jason Bay, appears to be on the short list for teams such as the Red Sox, Mariners and Angels, the club from Anaheim emerging in the last 24 hours as a potentially serious player.

I’m still completely blown away by the Cardinals give Brad Penny $7.5 million with incentives that could take the deal to $9 million. My question is a simple one – why?

If Ivan Rodriguez can get a 2-year deal for $6 million from the Nationals to be a part-timer, why are people freaking that Jason Kendall wants $5 to be a full-time starter? In an odd twist, he might get that starting role by joining Pudge’s old club, the Rangers.

Why are the Brewers looking to trade Corey Hart? Here is a direct quote from my Twitter page. “The Brewers seem intent on moving Corey Hart, though I don’t really know why. Haven’t they heard adage – buy low, sell high?”

Milton Bradley continues to have his name involved in more rumors than just about anyone else. Guess teams are really interested in adding a guy who can’t stay healthy, wears out his welcome in about four months, and constantly torments fans and teammates with his off putting attitude. Only in America can a guy like that make more money in a year, over $10 million, than 99 percent of us will make in our entire lives.

The Giants have been linked to names like Adrian Beltre, Kevin Kouzmanoff, Nick Johnson and Orlando Hudson. The club would prefer to have Pablo Sandoval to play third, but he could easily slide over to first if a third baseman is brought to town. The club could also move Freddy Sanchez over to third if they were to sign a second baseman like Hudson, but a year after struggling for any pop, do they really want a third baseman who is likely to hit about 10 bombs in Sanchez?

By Ray Flowers

Facts and Stuff

There were a few odd stories in the world of baseball today, as well as a few milestones that have almost been reached. Given that I love numbers and that I have always been considered a bit of an odd bird, it seemed only natural for me to touch on a handful of those storylines.

Justin Duchscherer will miss the rest of the season after being diagnosed with depression. “Justin has been battling this for quite some time, and it’s kind of reached the apex where he made a really tough decision and owned up to the problem,” agent Damon Lapa said. A year after posting a 2.54 ERA in 141.2 innings Justin’s follow up effort this season consisted of all of zero innings in the bigs.

Prince Fielder went deep again on Friday and now has 33 bombs and 110 RBI, the second figure leads the majors. He won’t hit 50-homers again, but he is almost a lock to best his pervious career best of 119 RBI.

There is no reason for the John Daly picture above other than the fact that I just really love the pants.

Aaron Hill hit his 29th home run on Friday night leaving him one short of a magical 30-HR season. Since 1980 only two other second basemen in the AL have hit that many and they are Alfonso Soriano (three times) and Brett Boone (twice). By the way, over Hill’s first 1,720 career at bats want to take a guess how many times he went deep? Try 28.

Jesus made an appearance in Washington D.C. today. Oops, my bad, that was just Stephen Strasburg.

Nick Johnson and the Marlins hope that his injured hamstring won’t place him on the DL. My thoughts? I think that Johnson has about as much chance of not ending on the DL as I do of not getting pretty well blitzed on Friday night. Did I mention I’m already three and a half beers in to what will almost certainly be a 12-pack night?

Garret Jones decided to start hitting again and has two homers in his last four games. Don’t look now but he has 14 homers and seven steals in 43 games meaning he is on a Mark Reynolds-esque pace of better than 40 homers and 25 steals. Who knew?

Jake Peavy will have his minor league start moved back from Sunday to Monday. I’ve said it before, and I’ll say it again – do NOT expect Peavy to be a difference maker until 2010.

Freddy Sanchez was out of the starting lineup for the eighth time in 21 games since joining the Giants. He is hitting .304 as a member of the club, but this certainly isn’t what the club had hoped for when they brought him into the mix.

Billy Wagner, whom I wrote of in my most recent Weekly Mailbag piece, has apparently been claimed off waivers by the Red Sox. That leaves the Mets with three choices. (1) They can simply dump Wagner and let the Sox have him (the Sox would be responsible for his salary). (2) They can work out a deal with the BoSox sending something to the Mets in exchange for Wagner. (3) The Mets can simply pull Wagner back off waivers and keep him – no harm no foul. Seems odd that the Mets want so desperately to move him, but it also seems odd to me that every team with a worse record than the Red Sox didn’t bother to put in a waiver-wire claim on Wagner. Maybe I should start circulating my articles to major league front offices?

By Ray Flowers

Will it Ever End?

The Pirates are at it again, and by “it” I mean the systematic dismantling of their major league roster as they plan for the mythical “future” when at some point they will be a good club once again. I don’t know when that will happen, hell I don’t know if will ever happen, but they are certainly giving it the old college try. Before I get to that, and is it just me or have the Pirates sucked up and abnormally huge portion of media attention of late, I want to let you all know that I’m not just going to bash the Pirates today, I’ll also bash other figures in the game of baseball as well. Maybe one of your “guys” will be on the list and you can leave a comment for me either agreeing or disagreeing with me on my take on each guy.

Today the Pirates dealt John Grabow and Tom Gorzelanny to the Cubs for Kevin Hart, Jose Ascanio and Josh Harrison. The people in Pittsburgh are going to need to have their players to wear neon signs with their names as they likely have no idea who and the heck the majority of these guys are at this point. I don’t have the list in front of me, and frankly I’m past the point of really caring, but off the top of my head the Pirates have given up the following players recently.

1B: Adam LaRoche
2B: Freddy Sanchez
SS: Jack Wilson
OF:Jason Bay, Nate McLouth, Xavier Nady, Nyjer Morgan
P: Ian Snell, Grabow, Gorzelanny

I’m sure there are guys I’m leaving out, but honestly, can the Pirates really say they are a better organization without those men? They might be a stronger organization, but their major league club is much, much worse. If “they” try to claim otherwise I wouldn’t be at all surprised to see their noses grow like Pinocchio’s.

Oh, and before I leave the Pirates just thought I would point out that Nyjer Morgan is hitting .482 since the All-Star break. I’m just saying.

David Ortiz and Manny Ramirez reportedly tested positive for steroids back in 2003. What a shock. Still, how is this information becoming public? Why did the court bother to make the records secret if people were going to openly flaunt that secrecy ruling and just leak out the info? Speaking of that list, why don’t the powers that be just dump out the whole list rather than one or two names leak out every month? Bottom line for me is that there is no way to verify what happened in 2003 and if players tested “positive” for something that was legal in baseball at the time, why is everyone flipping out? If you look hard enough you can probably find an NFL player who tests positive for steroids every week, yet no one seems to care in that sport do they?

Delusional Player of the Week – Russ Ortiz who still doesn’t get why the Astros weren’t kissing his feet for his work on the hill for them this season was released immediately after his outing on Thursday in which he allowed nine runs while recording just seven outs. With a 5.57 ERA and a 1.67 WHIP I wouldn’t be at all surprised if Russ doesn’t think he deserves a raise.

Brandon Webb had a mysterious “setback” in his attempt to return from a shoulder issue, and at this point he is being sent for more tests. “He’s not probably making the progress we were hoping for, so I think we have to make an assessment about what to do next,” GM Josh Byrnes said. So let me see if I have this straight. Webb’s shoulder has been a concern since last off-season when the club couldn’t get insurance on a potential long-term deal with Webb when the tests raised the issues in his shoulder. No matter, Webb continued to pitch and made all of one start before heading to the DL. It now appears nearly certain that he will require surgery, and if he does it is far from certain that he will be ready to go at the start of 2010. So here is the question – (a) why didn’t Webb undergo surgery last off-season if this was a concern or (b) why didn’t he do something differently, training wise, in order to avoid this outcome (perhaps he did but there was no stopping it)? Furthermore, why hasn’t he just undergone the procedure by this point since it’s clear he is done for the year? I would avoid surgery at all costs too, but that decision may end up costing Webb all of 2009 and some of 2010.

Joel Zumaya will head under the knife at some point in August to fix his shoulder, and his 2009 campaign is over after just 31 innings. Zumaya can still rush it up there with anyone in the game, his average heater this year was an astounding 99.3 mph, but dude simply cannot stay healthy. Is all of this the result of a bad body, poor luck or too much Guitar Hero? Beats me.

By Ray Flowers